Hello, and thanks for returning to the blog. This month I want to talk a little bit about a decision I have made. I don’t know how much I believe in fate or karma but I do try to keep an eye on what I put out into the universe, so it means a lot that I am going to put this out there. I have decided to give myself a year, this coming year to make a tier jump. I have decided that I am going to give my career 110% (so sorry to my friends who will see me less, and my husband who will get fewer date nights, and my dog who will get fewer excursions away from the tree house). I have also decided to vlog every day to document exactly what I did that day to further my cause. I have not decided if I will publish this vlog or not but I will have it to keep myself on track. If in this year I do succeed in making that tier jump I will continue on here in lovely Los Angeles, if however I fail in my mission, I will be considering my options.
This plan of mine is going to be difficult, I know this and am trying to prepare mentally. I feel that I do give a lot currently but I am not giving my all, I need to be honest about that. I spend a lot of time doing research; on shows, films, directors, casting directors and other industry professionals, I have even built a fully searchable database with information about everyone I research. Where I fall short is in the execution of reaching out to said industry professionals. Part of me feels like doing the research is hard enough and I should just be rewarded, I know this isn’t true I just wish it was. Like everyone, I have walls I have put up for one reason or another, I have told myself a lot of stories and I have made myself believe them. The thing is they are only stories, and I need to stop believing them. I need to stop using them as a veil or a krutch and just go out there fearlessly and make this thing happen.
I am currently formulating a plan, trying to set actionable goals, and thinking of creative ways to reach those goals. One of my big ‘blocks’ has been that I have been reluctant to reach out to theatrical agents, I have a lot of IMDB credits but they are mostly small indie films. I have been putting it off and putting it off because I have wanted to get the ever coveted costar roles they love so much before I attempt this seemingly impossible task of getting a theatrical agent when you aren’t 21 and beautiful. I do realize I will have to jump in at some point, because even though we as actors must do the work ourselves and get auditions ourselves, as we should, I have learned through agency internships, a good agent is gold.
This brings me to the title of my blog. In a push to get an agent I am rethinking and reworking all of my marketing materials. This past week I shot new headshots as my first step in this process. I shot with the lovely and talented Stephanie Nelson. Prior to my session I sat down and really gave some thought to what ‘looks’ I wanted to shoot. In the past this was always a daunting task for me. This time around I had a much clearer picture of exactly what I wanted to accomplish because last month I took a great marketing class with Jona Xiao. I highly recommend this class if you are struggling with actually marketing yourself the way I was struggling. We went over creating book-ability profiles, which are basically concise pages, featuring headshots, video and breakdowns that show casting exactly how to cast you. Through this process I came to the realization that I wasn’t really being clear in the past with the types I was trying to portray. So before the headshot session I went out ‘shopping for necklines’.
As we all too painfully know, our headshots are just chest up these days, and I find it difficult to express my personal style from the neck up. What I realized is that all we see in the photos as far as wardrobe goes is the neckline. I started watching TV with the express intent to pay attention to the wardrobe. In a close up shot we only see necklines, and you can get a good picture of who someone is just from that. I wanted to capture a suburban mother, a powerful lawyer and an artistic professional. Here is what we came up with, I think we did it.
I am going to take these shots and update Actors Access as well as use them in my book-ability profiles. Once I do that I’ll share those with you as well. The next step is to get tape for the specific types of roles I have shown in the headshots. I do have a good reel, but I don’t have exactly what I need to support the types I am going for. I am doing research currently to find a company I really love that does reel footage creation, because it has to be perfect. The footage has to look like it was pulled from TV or a big budget film. After I get all of these ducks in a row, I am going to start targeting the agencies I have had on my list to target for a year now.
This is how I plan to start the new year out. I also have a host of other things on my list but if I wrote everything this blog would be a full-fledged novel.
I will be incorporating all of my efforts into my future blog posts on this site. Please check back, I’d love to have you on this journey with me.